


Day 3: Law/Crime

by GemmaRose



Series: Prowl Week [3]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: False Identity, Functionist Universe (Transformers), Goodbyes, M/M, Rebellion, you had one job dammit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-21
Updated: 2020-04-21
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:48:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23768758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GemmaRose/pseuds/GemmaRose
Summary: Prowl's primary function it to Protect. If that means exploiting some loopholes and taking a...creativeinterpretation of a few laws, then that's what he'll do.
Relationships: Mesothulas (Transformers)/Prowl (Transformers)
Series: Prowl Week [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1709728
Comments: 1
Kudos: 42





	Day 3: Law/Crime

What they were doing was not, technically speaking, illegal. Ostaros didn’t officially exist, so creating a data record for him wasn’t _falsifying_ an identity. Just creating records for a mech who didn’t have any yet. Admittedly, he didn’t have any because the Council had never approved his creation, but that was neither here nor there.

“Done.” he said, running a little program one of Shockwave’s assistants had passed him from their scientist that would erase his tracks in the system. He pulled the data slug from the console, and held it out to Mesothulas’s- no, _their_ creation. Bright blue optics stared back at him, no longer wide and round but still endlessly inquisitive, shaded under a helm of Ostaros’s own design. “This has all the information you’ll need.”

A new designation, new function, the paperwork with his serial number and activation time and everything else mechs these days came with, including a guard post at Tor. Somehow, Mesothulas had managed to get his hands on first-boot protocols and extracted the data to a format that Ostaros could upload without wiping what he’d already learnt. Prowl hadn’t asked where the files came from. The less he knew, the less chance he would accidentally implicate his scientist.

“Do I have to go?” Ostaros whined, holding the data slug between two fingers and shooting Mesothulas a pleading look. Prowl would’ve been offended, except for the fact that Mesothulas had always been the softer of the two of them, especially when it came to their creation.

“I wish you didn’t.” Mesothulas murmured, moving closer to reach up and stroke Ostaros’s face. Their creation leaned into the touch, and as Prowl’s terminal shut down, records clean, he stepped over to run a hand down Ostaros’s back. It was still strange, seeing the small, soft-edged mech Mesothulas had crafted from their sparks and his own brilliance decked out in heavy armour and sturdy kibble. It would be stranger still not to see him at all, the little store room off the lab returned to its intended use.

“Don’t send me away.” Ostaros begged, leaning to press his whole frame against Mesothulas, rotor twitching under Prowl’s hand as the slender scientist braced himself against the weight of a fully armoured triple-changer.

“If you stay here, there’s a 79.8% chance that you will be discovered before the meta-cycle is out.” Prowl informed him. “Those aren’t odds either of us is willing to take.”

Ostaros’s shoulders slumped, field pressing abject misery against his own, and Prowl shifted closer still, wrapping an arm around their creation’s waist and leaning his helm against the back of one broad shoulder. Mesothulas’s arms stretched around both of them as much as they could, and Prowl wished that there were some other way. Sending Ostaros off under a new designation with falsified creation data gave him a better chance, but the odds still weren’t good, and Prowl wouldn’t be there to protect him. They’d given him armour, given him weapons and the datapacks that would teach him to use them, but the threats to Ostaros’s functioning were not the sort which could be eliminated with a gun or sword.

“We need to get going.” Prowl said, when the embrace dragged on past the klik he’d designated as the optimal time to depart. Ostaros’s field pulsed with petty, stubborn disagreement, but he didn’t restrain Mesothulas when his creator pulled away.

“Be good.” Mesothulas murmured, reaching up again to cup Ostaros’s cheeks, the one part of him still soft and round after his armour refit. “Be safe.” Mesothulas gently guided Springer's helm down to press a kiss to the top of it, and Prowl drew them both towards the door Ostaros had never been allowed past before. Outside of the lab was _dangerous_ , for a mech who wasn’t supposed to exist. They had no choice now, though. The shipment of new guards left at midnight on the dot, and if Ostaros wasn’t on it... Prowl would rather not contemplate that.

\---

“Did you hear about the incident at Tor yet?” Skids asked, a deca-cycle into Mesothulas having an empty, quiet lab. Prowl stiffened, and only long practice kept his doorwings from flaring up in obvious alarm.

“No. Do tell.” he replied, forcing himself to take a sip of his fuel. He had an alert in the system to ping him with any incident reports from Tor, but nothing of note had come in through it yet. Primus, he hoped nothing had slipped past his sensors.

“Well, it’s all very hush-hush right now.” Skids’s optics crinkled as he sipped at his fuel. “But a friend I have there tells me that they lost a few guards the other meg. Went MIA in the night, vanished without a trace.”

“Why keep that quiet?” Prowl frowned, doorwings low and tight as his tacnet chewed on the available data. Insufficient input, too many probable causes to list.

“Because one of the mechs was _Whirl_.” Skids’s optics shone, and Prowl’s doorwings fluttered in shock. Whirl was... not quite famous, but certainly Known amongst security mechs. One of the oldest aerials in the Council’s employ, with old-fashioned empurata and a discipline record longer than Prowl was tall. No one knew why he hadn’t been slagged yet, but wherever he was stationed was certain to be dull, at least from a security perspective. Interpersonal relations were another story, but they always were.

“Did your friend happen to name any other mechs?” Prowl asked, keeping his tone carefully modulated to the appropriate level of polite interest.

“Nah, just said they were security from all over the compound.” he shrugged, resting a hand on Prowl’s arm and tracing the number 4 on his plating. “One of them had just arrived this deca-cycle.”

“That’s a shame.” Prowl said noncommittally, forcing himself to take another sip of his fuel. He had to get back to the lab, had to get on his private terminal and find out if their creation had fragged up the _one thing_ they asked of him.

The chime of an incoming message rang out across the canteen, and Prowl’s HUD filled with red, dark text superimposing over his vision a moment later. Wanted: Enemies of the State.

“Oh this can’t be good.” Skids muttered next to him.

**Unit Designation:** The Wreckers.  
**Classification:** Terrorists.  
Armed and dangerous. Lethal force authorised.

The message scrolled up off his HUD before he could read the rest of the supplementary information, and was replaced by nine images, each tagged with a designation and some supporting information. Not that any security mech or lab assistant getting this memo _wouldn’t_ recognise Whirl on sight. Four ex-security mechs, two miners turned construction workers, and three identical mechs with no discernable altmode or listed function. And there, front and center and tagged as their _leader_ , was Springer.

**Frag.**

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies to any not-logged-in readers, but due to an ex who refuses to leave me alone I have had to disable anon comments. Kudos are still open though, and if you want to scream (or would like me to write a fic for you) come check me out on Pillowfort! No account required to get my discord, and I'm always happy to chat. [[Link](https://www.pillowfort.social/GemmaRose)]


End file.
